Announcing the decision today, Planning Minister Kristina Keneally said it was an important day for the local Redfern community, which has long been wracked by drugs, unemployment and poverty.
"It's a step forward to creating a modern and a vibrant and a sustainable community," she said.
The plan, named the Pemulwuy Project after a renowned Aboriginal warrior, includes a gym, an elders' cultural centre, 500 metres of public open space and 62 new apartments that Aboriginal people will be able to buy.
Aboriginal Housing Company chief executive Mick Mundine says the approval is a step towards reconciliation for Redfern's Aboriginal community.
"Man, she's been a hard road," he said.
"A lot of people said we couldn't do it. You've got to have faith, be humble and stick to your principles.
"Our people have struggled and suffered so long in this community. It's a brand new day."
Construction is still some way off; the Aboriginal Housing Company has to submit detailed project plans and get financial backing.
Mr Mundine says he is confident of securing funding.
"People say, 'Where's the money coming from?' Hey, I don't know yet," he said. "But just have a bit of faith in life and the money will flow in."
But Opposition planning spokesman Brad Hazzard says it is a tough time to be seeking finance and the project should receive government assistance.
"Redfern and The Block mean a lot to Aboriginal people all across Australia," he said.
"They have fought this Government for 10 years to get a development approval. It is time that this Government came to the party in terms of supporting with funding."
The state and federal governments are refusing to say whether they will chip in.
Local community leader Shane Phillips says the decision is an opportunity for residents to take ownership of the area.
"The Block is the epitome for some time of what went wrong," he said. "We're going to turn that around. We're going to show people how we can solve it."
The area has made huge steps in cutting crime in recent days but long-time Block resident Margaret Blair has her doubts the project will go ahead.
"I've been here since I was a child and look at it," she said. "There's no change and there'll never be a change."
The State Government says the project will create 200 construction jobs, as well as 100 full-time positions once the redevelopment is complete.
Source: www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/07/02/2615114.htm?section=australia
]]>In his apology, Rudd declared that "the mood of the nation is for reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians". According to Sol Bellear, Chair of the Redfern-based Aboriginal Medical Service, "a lot of non-Aboriginal people seem to think that now the apology's been made, it's the end of disadvantage and poverty for Aboriginal people. It's not."
On 16th February 2004, the Sydney suburb of Redfern was the scene of the worst race riot in the city's history. Since then, John Howard's centre-right Liberal Party administration was ousted by Rudd's Australian Labor Party (ALP), in October 2007.
Redfern is located on the edge of Sydney's central business district (CBD).According to Heidi Norman, who has written extensively about Redfern's Aboriginal community, the Stolen Generation became identified with the suburb. "Many Aboriginal people who grew up in institutions found their way back to their families through Redfern" she says. The bulk of Redfern's Aboriginal population is concentrated in a series of streets known as ‘the Block', situated on the suburb's western border. At the centre of the Block, which occupies less than 8000 square feet, is a new architecture-designed community centre. This is surrounded by dilapidated Victorian terraces and Aboriginal murals which seem incongruous with the gleaming Manhattan-style skyscrapers visible in the distance. The Block is owned by the Aboriginal Housing Company. Initially, it represented something of an innovation as an Aboriginal-run housing project.
Over time, the Block has acquired a reputation for being a ‘no go' area for outsiders. Statistics indicate that Redfern's crime rate is twice or three times that of the New South Wales (NSW) state average in a number of areas. Since the 1990s, the public image of the Block has been tarnished by the heroin trade that has proliferated, particularly among young Aboriginal people. One local resident tells me: "You would probably have trouble buying heroin in most parts of Sydney, but it's dealt pretty openly here".
Beyond the Block, Redfern has been subject to varying degrees of gentrification. Proposals to bulldoze the Block and extend the business district into Redfern are said to have created something of a siege mentality among local Aboriginal people. Criminologist Chris Cunneen describes the local Aboriginal community as "much more highly politicised than a lot of other communities", with a particular history of tensions between police and the suburb's Aboriginal community.
The Redfern riot of 2004 is emblematic of these tensions. On 16th February a night of ‘unparalleled' rioting began following the death of a seventeen year-old Aboriginal teenager TJ Hickey. Police were attacked with bricks, bottles and petrol bombs, and the railway station was set alight. The teenager, who had a history with local police, had been cycling to visit his mother, who lived in the Block. On the way, he lost control of his bike and crashed into a railway fence, where he was impaled on spikes. Many Redfern Aboriginal people maintain he was being pursued by a police vehicle. They also say it was provocation by police that sparked the riot among mourners on the following day,
Ray Minniecon, a pastor in the Aboriginal Evangelical Fellowship and veteran Redfern activist, puts the riot down to a build-up of frustration and anger on the part of young Aboriginal people as a result of persistent police harassment. "My own kids have asked ‘Dad, why do the police pick on me? They don't pick on the Asians. They don't pick on the white fellas.' You can understand the anger they feel at not being allowed to be who they are and enjoy the same freedoms as other young people in Sydney", he tells me.
Research backs up this claim that Aboriginal youths are stopped and searched more frequently than their white peers. Cunneen agrees. "There is an expectation, particularly in Redfern, that if you're young and Aboriginal, you're going to get a hard time of the police."
Ray Minniecon suggests that the riot might have played out differently had the apology been issued beforehand. Research into the Redfern riot has indeed identified Aboriginal peoples' history of colonisation and dispossession as a factor influencing the sense of exclusion and ‘generalised hostility' felt by the youths involved. The wording of Rudd's apology went some way towards addressing this.
Ostensibly, the apology was concerned primarily with the Stolen Generation of some fifty-thousand Aboriginal children forcibly removed from their families between 1910 and 1970. However, it was broadly received as an acknowledgement of the consequences of white settlement on the indigenous population.
On a practical level, the apology proposed a vision for reducing the life-expectancy, economic and educational differentials between white and indigenous Australians called ‘Closing the Gap'. No mention was made of the intervention (or Northern Territory National Emergency Response) begun by the Howard government in 2007. This followed publication of a report alleging rampant child neglect and sexual abuse within the Aboriginal communities of the Northern Territory. A range of measures were implemented ranging from changes to land tenure, the quarantining of welfare benefits, the deployment of extra police and restrictions on alcohol use. The Howard government suspended the Race Discrimination Act.
Controversy still surrounds the effectiveness of the intervention. Those opposed consider it to have been punitive and to have infantilised the majority of Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory who had no involvement with child abuse. But although many were expecting the Rudd government to discontinue the intervention, they were disappointed.
Soll Bellear, Chair of the Aboriginal Medical Service, and a member of his local Labor Party considers the Rudd government to have reneged on several of their election promises relating to Rudd's vision for ‘closing the gap'. These relate to housing, education and criminal justice. The health indicators of Australian Aboriginals lag behind those of other indigenous peoples across the world, he points out. Even after the apology, the Australian government is failing to address Aboriginal issues holistically. They are not consulting the Aboriginal people. "Aboriginal issues require Aboriginal solutions" he emphasises.
The references in Rudd's apology to the importance of ‘localised' and ‘flexible' solutions are, in Bellear's view, demonstrative of a "white perspective". According to Bellear, the ‘gap', alluded to by Rudd, was being closed more rapidly in the 1970s and 80s by "community-controlled" organisations such as the Aboriginal Medical Service.
Shane Phillips, an Aboriginal Redfern resident whose family have lived in the suburb for generations, is the CEO of an organisation called Tribal Warrior. This non-profit community organisation provides specialised training programmes oriented around the maritime industry to create job opportunities for its clients. One of its key objectives is the promotion of social, economic and cultural development among Aboriginal people and communities. Of the Rudd apology, Phillips says "It was a good start." He argues that Aboriginal people need to rise above anger and indignation, however justified, in order to achieve the social and economic development envisaged by his organisation. Phillips describes some of the economic development that has begun to take place in the Block. This includes the emergence of five Aboriginal-owned businesses. A decade ago, there was only one.
Phillips' vision of social and economic development among Redfern's Aboriginal community is consistent with Sol Bellear's view that the 'gap' can be more effectively closed by community-controlled organisations. For his part, Phillips feels that it is important that Redfern's Aboriginal community stands its ground in the face of gentrification. He tells me that Redfern is of massive symbolic importance to Aboriginal people across Australia. "That's why we've go to remain here".
For several years, the Aboriginal Housing Company (AHC) has sought to promote revitalisation of the Block through the Pelmulwuy Project. This involves a number of housing and employment-related programmes. However, the project has stalled due to wrangling between the AHC and the New South Wales government. Some, like Shane Phillips, are still hopeful that the project might yet get off the ground. Others are more pessimistic. "The government won't fund Aboriginal economic development projects" says Ray Minniecon.
Heidi Norman maintains that Aboriginal people are likely to be worst-affected in Australia, by the global economic downturn. Increasingly limited resources will diminish Aboriginal organisations' chances of securing funding for such projects. The apology is by no means unappreciated by Redfern's Aboriginal community and those associated with it. One resident of the Block, I spoke to, even says that it "has created a bit of a change" in the area. However, Redfern seems like an uncertain place facing an uncertain future.
Life expectancy
At 60, it is 20 years behind the average non-indigenous Australian. That of New Zealand Maoris and American First People is over 70 years.
Education
A report in 2006 in The Australian indicates that many Aboriginal adults living in remote areas have the literacy skills of a ten-year old. Only 3% of Aboriginal students complete a university degree.
But the proportion of Aboriginal people aged 15 years and over achieving qualifications is up from 20% in 2001 to 25% in 2006.
Health
Drug use is twice as high as that of non-indigenous Australians
Poverty
72% live in relative poverty
Unemployment
Between 2001 and 2006, Aboriginal unemployment fell from 20% to 16%, but remains over three times that of the non-Aboriginal population
This article is published by James Patterson, and openDemocracy.net under a Creative Commons licence. www.opendemocracy.net/article/saying-sorry-is-not-enough
]]>
Once a month, locals door-knock the neighbourhood, calling on all drug users and sellers to take a "day off" for what the community calls a Redfern family day. "This is us saying we've had enough," says organiser Shane Phillips.
James, not his real name, is one user. "I hate my life" he says. "I don't want my daughter growing up without a father." James says if Redfern doesn't change, its unlikely he will either.
Living Black video journalist Yaara Bou Melhem went along on the door-knock and found addicts and dealers who are desperately trying to find a different life.
TRANSCRIPT
Redfern has had its fair share of negative attention, not least of all for riots, drugs and violence. But the community here is fed-up and is taking matters into its own hands, by hosting drug-free family days each month. Video journalist Yaara Bou Melhem brings this report on a grassroots community campaign to clean up the streets of Redfern.
VOICEOVER: Redfern's family day event is kicking off in a just few hours time, and organisers are taking on the uncomfortable task of asking drug users and dealers to take the day off.
SHANE PHILIPS, BABANA MEN'S GROUP: So, basically, what we're doing, we hand these out, we go around, people take these. They don't always receive them nicely, but most people do, because they know they're not part of it.
VOICEOVER: Shane Phillips coordinates the event. He's going door-to-door, telling his neighbours there'll be no drinking or drug use, at least for today.
SHANE PHILLIPS: Family and culture day's on again today
MAN: Yeah, bro, yeah.
SHANE PHILLIPS: and as you know, it's alcohol-free and drug-free. Family Day is about reclaiming our community from substance abuse - the sale of substances, drug dealing, people drinking in the street.
VOICEOVER: Family days have been running for the past six months.
Well, it's great. It's a pity it's not every day. It's for these little ones.
VOICEOVER: But it hasn't always gone down well.
SHANE PHILLIPS: Most times what I do is go around, knock on a door, get abused - no, not all the time.
VOICEOVER: Shane says the community is reclaiming the streets of Redfern, to give children the healthy environment they deserve.
SHANE PHILIPS: The signal is we've had enough. We don't want it here. It's not part of our culture.
VOICEOVER: The Block is one of Australia's best-known urban Aboriginal communities, for all the wrong reasons. It's long been associated with crime and drug abuse.
BRAD FREEBURN, ABORIGINAL MEDICAL SERVICE: I really don't know where the turning point was. I really don't. All of a sudden it was like we had this major epidemic.
Brad Freeburn has been working with Redfern's addicts for more than 15 years.
BRAD FREEBURN: Redfern, you got Redfern station - that's pretty central, isn't it? You think about it, 'cause they could get their drugs, they'd get their needles, and they had somewhere to shoot up. And it was this trifecta effect.
VOICEOVER: Needles litter The Block in Redfern.
JOHN: This is the local shooting gallery, yeah. This is where they all shoot up. They shoot up in the corner, over the back, up the lane - you've got another two places round the back here where they do it.
John has been a heroin addict for almost 30 years and offers to show me around The Block.
JOHN: Got a couple of people having a nudge now - I call it a nudge, like a shot - won't be too specific. I'll take you over here, and I'll show you this other place where they do their business. We got kids here - kids play in this little part here, and we got 'em using behind this old van. Just watch yourself as you walk past it. As you can see, there's all paraphernalia here - fit packets and needles and spoons.
REPORTER: So kids play here?
JOHN: Kids play in that little street just behind us here.
VOICEOVER: John has overdosed twice on heroin. He's seeking help for his addiction and is currently on a methadone program. Like most of the people living in Redfern, John knows exactly where he can score.
JOHN: It's a couple of houses over the back - I won't mention any numbers or anything - couple of these houses over here, you can buy it over there.
This 23-year-old says he's speaking with Living Black because he's looking for help. James - not his real name - says there aren't many drugs he doesn't use.
'JAMES': Heroin, coke, speed, LSD, trips - anything to get high - a bit of dope, smoke a bit of weed. I can be more than what I am and I know I can be more than what I am. And I hate what I'm doing to myself.
VOICEOVER: James says he's been in and out of jail and hardly sees his 5-year-old daughter.
'JAMES': I don't want my daughter growing up without a father, if you know what I mean. I could have a shot tomorrow and OD and not come out of it, and I wouldn't want my daughter to say, "Oh, where's my daddy? Where's my dad?" And every night I cry over her.
VOICEOVER: Although James says he wants help, living in Redfern isn't making it very easy.
'JAMES': I dunno - just living in this environment brings a bad vibe to other people and me, myself and young boys and girls my age - it's not a good place to be at the time of growing up. I don't like what I'm doing, but that's the way of life.
BRAD FREEBURN: I feel sorry for families ringing up, going, "I want this bloke in a rehab," or "this girl in a rehab". I say, "Do they know you're ringing?" and they say "No." I say, "We can start it all happening, "but until they walk in the door, nothing's going to happen." That's what you got to tell 'em.
VOICEOVER: Community leader Mick Mundine wants to change Redfern's future.
MICK MUNDINE: That's the needle bus there, right? That's the children's playground, back over there, and this is Redfern Community Centre.
VOICEOVER: He says the needle exchange van is a honey-pot for drug users.
MICK MUNDINE, ABORIGINAL HOUSING COMPANY: Now I believe that needle bus is just destroying our children's mind. I mean, when they grow up they think, "Geez, it's normal to have a needle bus there, "it's normal to get a needle, "it's normal to go shoot up and buy drugs." We got to break that vicious cycle.
VOICEOVER: He's given the needle bus service an ultimatum - move it, or else.
MICK MUNDINE: I gave 'em 10 months. I said, "If the bus isn't out of the community in 10 months, "you'll be locking me up in jail"
VOICEOVER: The health service has justified its visible presence here in Redfern, saying it's one of Sydney's drug hot spots. It says tens of thousands of clean needles are handed out here every month.
PAUL HABER, SYDNEY SW HEALTH SERVICE: Unfortunately, although it's unpleasant at times, our obligation is to prevent outbreaks of HIV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C.
VOICEOVER: Drug use may be an ongoing problem in Redfern, but police say drug-related crime has dropped dramatically in the area over the past seven months.
SUPERINTENDENT LUKE FREUDENSTEIN, REDFERN POLICE: The figures are basically a third down on what we've had before, and I do believe days like the family day certainly contribute.
SHANE PHILLIPS: Seeing kids play around the place and enjoy being kids is enough for me. And for those fellas who are in the system, this is what it's about, this place now, The Block is about strength and unity and what we can do as a people.
Source: Living Black, SBS - http://news.sbs.com.au/livingblack/blockaid_563617
]]>Carbon trading schemes work on a cap and trade system: a limit is set on the amount of carbon companies can emit in a given time period. If a company goes over its allocated portion of carbon emissions, it has to buy carbon credits from another market participant that has emitted less than its allocation and can therefore profitably trade them. Critics of the scheme say that companies will avoid making the necessary infrastructural changes to reduce emissions by keeping the price of carbon credits low.
A carbon trading scheme is set to be introduced in Australia in 2010. Mr Mundine believes the scheme has the potential to generate investment and jobs for Indigenous communities which own vast tracts of land across Australia but he warns viewing carbon trading as a cure-all.
“We do not want to get people thinking this is a panacea for economic woes in their community. It’s not. It is part of a package that can help their community. We want to ensure that Indigenous people are not ripped off and that they don’t miss the boat on the opportunities for their communities.”
The AICC is currently conducting research to identify the ways the emissions scheme can benefit Aboriginal communities.
“We need support by our community and the wider community to see that it is a simple tool that could help everyone – a national Indigenous trading strategy which allows our people to be part of the process, at the beginning rather than down at the end, which is what normally happens to us,” says Shane Phillips, one of the AICC’s directors and Chief Executive of the Tribal Warrior Association that runs tours on Sydney Harbour. “Our people have known for thousands of years how the ecology works. I think we have a lot to offer to the rest of the world and that has been something that has been overlooked,” Mr Phillips says.
Photo: Ali Blogg- Caption: Warren Mundine
Source: South Sydney Herald February 2009 www.southsydneyherald.com.au
]]>Phillips, who grew up on The Block, remembers how difficult it was growing up black with little positive reinforcement at school or in wider society. “But at night I’d hear all the great stories. My parents were grounded, tried, made mistakes, maintained survival. They were honest – it was tough out there, but positive.”
It was that emotional investment which inspired Phillips to become an achiever and contribute positively to help his community.
“All of us have a role to protect and build community. It is not the Koori thing to just care about yourself, because community affects everyone,” says Phillips. “I was lucky to come from a family who talked about the great Aboriginal role models, in politics and sport … If you believe in the good things black people have done, if you think you can do it too, you can be a contributor.”
Phillips believes that building that sense of confidence and self-worth is an essential part of Indigenous empowerment. “A lot of kids are made to feel inferior … we’ve got to promote the value and importance of the Aboriginal people and the importance of feeling proud of who you are,” he says. “It’s easy for kids to be angry. But that anger is our enemy.”
It is this philosophy that is used in Tribal Warrior training programs which focus on developing skills and self-sufficiency. “It might be simple things like learning about work ethic or completing a task. If anyone can gain a sense of worth from it, people start to reinforce their sense of belonging and self worth,” says Phillips.
It is these small things Phillips says that can have a big impact. “I see people come through with heroin and ice addictions, family problems, etc., who come to realise they have always been worth something and become leaders in their communities.”
One of the key successes of the program is the mentoring required from former graduates of the program, which allows young people to see role models who have come through similar experiences and succeeded. “We can all relate [to their issues] and can create pathways and show that we are there for them,” says Phillips.
The best part of the job, he says, is watching people change their lives around with a renewed sense of their own purpose and dignity. “I saw people who would not look people in the eye, who with non-Aboriginal people would feel inferior. I see these same people articulating their own circumstances. These guys have become mentors and role models. That is what just blows me away.”
To book a cruise or charter on the Tribal Warrior, or to make a donation, visit www. tribalwarrior.org or call (02) 9699 3491.
Source: South Sydney Herald October 2008 www.southsydneyherald.com.au
]]>She said her own priorities would include housing, public safety, lighting, better use of public space, and more recreational facilities. “There isn’t a swimming pool south of Cleveland Street while there’s five north of it. They promised the Southern Sydney Aquatic Centre four years ago, and they haven’t even decided on a site yet.”
She also called for a good quality, multi-purpose neighbourhood centre that could be a focus for the community.
She is a strong supporter of the stalled Pemulwuy Project for the redevelopment of the Block. “If it gets off the ground there would be a huge amount of Aboriginal employment in the area. We need the Pemulwuy Project to start, so that there is diverse Aboriginal residency; so that you’ve got public housing, key worker housing, and some private housing all in the one area.” She was optimistic about the project moving forward despite current difficulties.
The issue of carbon trading was raised, and local leader Shane Phillips stressed the importance of involving the Aboriginal community in the process. “It would be great if our people had an opportunity to help try and save the environment through ways that our people have been doing for thousands of years.”
Mr Phillips spoke for many at the meeting when he affirmed the importance of education: “Let the kids learn about their own identity, and their family’s identity, and the big picture, so that they can see the value of education and gain a sense of belonging, and a sense of worth.”
Source: South Sydney Herald August 2008 www.southsydneyherald.com.au
]]>The frank responses of those in the documentary make for thought-provoking viewing. Shane Phillips, Redfern community leader, comments that the Intervention Laws are “apartheid” instigated “under the false pretences of protecting children”.
Vincent Forrester concurred. “These laws have done more harm, other than shooting us,” he says in the film.
Others in the documentary comment on the ineffectiveness and brutality of imposing a system of laws on a set of people – and that for any system to work it needs to be devised with the inclusion of the Aboriginal people themselves. Shane Phillips commented that the laws are a bad set of rules that “takes away our identity and doesn’t deal with any of our issues”. Another person interviewed advised: “The Intervention is really an intervention into the pride and integrity of the Aboriginal people.”
Many confronting perspectives in the film are in relation to the laws restricting the consumption of alcohol, but which are viewed as doing nothing to address the reason why Aborigines drink. Walter Shaw, a young Aboriginal activist, commented that there is “no doubt that there is a problem with alcohol, but you need to look at the predispositions of people, the barriers in their life”.
One Aboriginal man commented: “I am not allowed to drink in public places but the public place is my home – the police say ‘Go home’ but how can I go home when this is my home?”
A couple of young white males, obviously drinking outside a bar, are asked their opinion on the Intervention. “Aboriginals in the Northern Territory are moving to South Australia to escape the Intervention Laws – so they can drink,” says one. When the filmmaker comments on their own drinking, they respond: “The difference is we are civilised.”
Professor Behrendt commented at the end of the screening that she was surprised to hear the rhetoric of Jenny Macklin, Minister of Indigenous Affairs, in that the Intervention was all about the children. “This is the same rhetoric of the Howard Government,” she commented. She added that many Australians would be “outraged” if they were fully aware of how the Intervention Laws were affecting those who had to abide by them.
Aunty Millie Ingram added: “You can’t dissect the Intervention; it’s got to be thrown out!”
Shane Phillips thanked all who attended and urged everyone to work together to abolish the dispossession of the Aboriginal people. As to the way forward he stated: “It is about empowerment. About belief in the pride and strength of our people and our people will survive.”
For more information about the Stop the Intervention Collective Sydney (STICS) you can contact Sarah on 0409 148 226.
Photo: The intervention is giving increased confidence to racist behaviour in Alice Springs
Source: South Sydney Herald August 2008 www.southsydneyherald.com.au
]]>The idea was inspired by Shane’s passion for doing something new and positive in the community. Shane, Ken Zulumovski, David Beaumont and Mark Carroll decided that it was important to attempt to use ancient holistic principles and Aboriginal culture and spiritual values to create a strong men’s self-healing space. David Leha joined with Nathan Leslie and camera-man Mark Taylor. The training program was completed in December 2007.
The program is currently running each Monday night at the Community Centre Redfern, from 5.30 to 8.30pm. Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal men are welcome to join any time, after they agree to abide by the men’s group agreement and complete a nomination form.
“I have been interested in looking at different ways that we can work on building emotional and inner strength. We as a community have created this program and everyone who attends takes an ownership of it and can join in the great feeling that we all receive as a result of attending,” says Ken Zulumovski, worker in the field of Aboriginal mental health and social and emotional well-being for 10 years.
Principles and techniques such as breathing and relaxation, anger management and cultural healing techniques are used. Compassion, honour, community service and increased awareness are explored. This is being constantly enhanced by a strong Aboriginal perspective, influence and now ownership of the program.
“Inspired by Shane, we thought it was time to try and bring some men together, to share ownership and wisdom and to create a healing space focusing more on the here and now and where people want to go, to help begin a detoxification process not only of the body and mind but perhaps even the spirit,” says Mark Carroll.
David Leha who performs as Radical Son and conducts Gamarada anger management and healing sessions is paid for his healing skills by the Government. He says, “For many years now, from a background of anger, prison, violence and my own pain, I have learnt to open my mind and to take in things which can help me with my own healing. Gamarada has inspired and given me many new skills which I am now using to support others in their own healing.”
There are various Aboriginal men’s groups and programs in the community now. Some of these are Walking Together Aboriginal program for people on probation or parole, Babana (www.treocom.net/babana/) which provides a powerhouse of men’s and community events and is chaired by Mark Spinks (note: all current Gamarada leaders are Babana members) and now Gamarada. All of these programs are complementary and have their own distinctive way of supporting Aboriginal men.
We are open to the community supporting Gamarada. You can email us on gamarada07@yahoo.com. Or you can email Ken on kenzulumovski@yahoo.com.au or David on dbeaumont@cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au for some more info about the program or look at our web page www.treocom.net/gamarada/.
Source: South Sydney Herald June 2008 www.southsydneyherald.com.au ]]>Reading is important. The Exodus Foundation is in Alexandria and now the Smith Family’s reading program, Learning for Life is operating in the same suburb. The Smith Family will run the “Student to Student” reading program over terms 2 and 3 in 2008, with the help of mentor students from local schools. The students will ring their reading buddies three times a week and the mentor students will read to them for about 20 minutes. This program has been running for eight years and is expanding next year at record numbers. To support the student mentors, the Smith Family requires capable and caring community members to volunteer as mentor supervisors. The mentor supervisors encourage and support the mentor students, by phoning them every week or fortnight and “catching-up”, and also by helping with any problems. If you are interested in helping, ring the Smith Family on 9699 9820 or drop in to their office at Alexandria Park Community Centre. It’s good to see NGOs working hard encouraging reading among the young people in the inner city community.
Leigh Coleman, who for years has, among other things, run Hillsong’s welfare services, is moving on from Hillsong. Now it seems that Hillsong will vacate the old Good Government Building in Little Eveleigh Street.
This column has long been concerned about the St Vincent’s Presbytery on Redfern Street that’s been in a state of decay for years. Now there seems to be a ray of hope as a prominent business person has made an offer to the Catholic Archdiocese for the old building and, we understand, the sheltered workshop that is next door to the old courthouse. Something has to happen to the old Presbytery building – hopefully soon.
Redfern artist, Pamela Neville, will be represented in an exhibition at the Balmain Watch House in February. Pamela has been painting full time for the past fve years and produces mainly small expressive works in oils and mixed media – personal responses to the land and its colour. Her works have been hung in numerous exhibitions, including the Camden Art Prize, Fishers Ghost Art Prize and the Surry Hills Festival. She has recently completed two years at the Sydney Gallery School Meadowbank TAFE where her works were highly regarded. She is represented in numerous private collections, both here and interstate. Some of her recent works are by invitation of the Balmain Peninsula Park Painters. This group has been meeting regularly for a number of years in the open spaces of Balmain. A special focus of this year’s exhibition will include the working tugs moored in front of the Colgate buildings on Mort Bay. The group will hold its 4th Annual Exhibition for one weekend only at the Balmain Watch House, 179 Darling Street Balmain at 10-4pm on Saturday February 23 and Sunday February 24. The opening will be from 6-8pm on Friday February 22.
The Surry Hills Neighbourhood Centre, now homeless since it had to move out of the Surry Hills Library building in Crown Street, is being redeveloped. Its child-care service is operating over in Pine Street, Chippendale, and its administration is at the rear of the Bourke Street Public School. They have had a tough year but the Festival in 2007 was a great success if the amount raised is anything to go by. Linda Scott, the Chairperson, told this column that they raised $75,000. If you’re interested in having a say in the future of the Centre, why not join them at their Planning Day? It will be held on Saturday March 15. Ring the Centre on 9310 2888 for more details.
On Tuesday February 12, a busload of people from the Redfern Aboriginal community is off to Canberra to take part in a rally at Parliament House. The group says it wants to mobilise people for the re-instatement of the Racial Discrimination Act, demand an immediate review of the Northern Territory intervention, end welfare quarantines, compulsory land acquisition and “mission manager” powers. It is also calling for the implementation of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. We will have a report for you on their protest next month.
For more information ring Shane Phillips 0414 077 631.
The Beresford Hotel in Bourke Street, Surry Hills, currently has approval for hours of operation from 10am to 1am the following day, Monday to Sunday. The management wants to extend these hours to 3am. Imagine living next door to a pub that is open to 3am! If you live near the Beresford in Bourke Street, why not email and tell us what you think? If you live next door to any pub that opens to 3am and it doesn’t bother you, we would love to hear from you. Email me trevrssh@bigpond.net.au
Source: South Sydney Herald February 2008 - www.southsydneyherald.com.au
]]>Phillips called on Indigenous and non-Indigenous people to support one another. “We should spend at least 70 % of our time and energy on celebrating the positives, and only 30% on the negatives,” he lamented. “I’m so proud of Aboriginal peoples and what they’ve achieved. All of us have roles – performers, sportspeople, community workers. You are all community leaders,” he said.
The afternoon featured drumming, dancing, choirs, bands and musicians from all over the world. The Doudoumba Drums of Africa was a big hit with the audience. As was the country-styled Sharnee Fenwick Band. Fenwick won the Young Deadly of the Year in 2006 at the Opera House and has a song nominated for Song of the Year in 2007. ::.
Photo: Andrew Collis - The Sharnee Fenwick Band
Photo: Andrew Collis - The Doudoumba Drums of Africa
Source South Sydney Herald September 2007 - www.southsydneyherald.com.au ]]>A few paces towards the heart of the Block, on a grassy knoll with striking views of the city skyline, the picture is quite different. There's a fundraiser on today, to renovate a dance space at the Elouera "Tony Mundine" gym, and a band is playing on a makeshift stage. Kids dance and line up for sausages: locals and community supporters picnic in small huddles, laughing and moving to the music. Directly behind the stage is the back wall of the gym, covered with a painting of the Aboriginal flag: yellow for the sun, red for the earth, black for the skin.
To the right is Eveleigh Street, the most infamous of the four narrow roadways that frame what has become known as "the Block", the badly deteriorated urban hub for Aboriginal people in Sydney. About halfway along Eveleigh Street, the last in a row of terrace houses looks like a casualty of the Blitz. Blackened shingles hang loosely from its soot-coated roof frame.
An old yellow sign shows the crossroad is Holden Street. The name of the iconic Australian car company is the symbol of the Australian dream: the Holden in the driveway of the three-bedroom suburban bungalow. In the heart of Redfern, it adorns a burnt-out building. The irony seems callous.
In 1973, Prime Minister Gough Whitlam provided the initial grant to the Aboriginal Housing Company (AHC) to allow the first housing purchases on this parcel of land in Redfern and the Block became the birthplace of urban land rights in this country. At that time, there were 102 houses in and immediately around the Block. Now, only 19 inhabited homes remain. While some have fallen victim to arson attacks by disgruntled tenants, others have been razed by the AHC to prevent their use as drug houses. More than anything else, drugs have been the scourge of this place, bringing unemployment, crime, poverty, sickness and death.
The land itself is just under 8000 square metres. But what the Block lacks in size, it makes up for in significance. For the people who populate it - whether residents or visitors - it is the cornerstone of an Aboriginal presence in our biggest capital city, a meeting place for indigenous people from across the country and a landmark that serves as a reminder of our native people to the other 98 per cent of the population.
Shane Phillips lives on Holden Street. He is a long-term resident of the Block, having moved in at the age of five with his father, Dick Blair, one of the founding members of the AHC, his mother and his eight brothers and sisters.
His father went on to become the local pastor, a community role model; his eldest sister died of a heroin overdose. His experience of the Block illustrates its polarity - the way it can give hope and take it away. "It's been tough," he says. "We've learned the hard way, that's for sure."
The 41-year-old skipper of the Tribal Warrior vessels - two historic boats that host cultural tours on Sydney harbour - is desperate to find a way forward. "I'm passionate about change because generations of our people will survive because of it. If we can't have one community in Sydney - the front-line of the colony - that can be a positive place for our people, then they might as well just shoot us all."
The answer, he says, is to give successful Aboriginal people the opportunity to reshape the Block from the inside out. "Now is the time to give us a real chance," he says. "If you were to put working people in here who want to raise their kids and not worry about drugs in the street, who care about neighbourhood watch and cultural values, you'd see a vast change coming about."
That would be a major turnaround to what exists now. To many Sydneysiders, the Block is a no-go zone: a drug-, alcohol- and crime-ridden ghetto across the road from Redfern train station. Some consider it a blight on the landscape and want it bulldozed; others suspect developers have plans to seize it and exploit its obvious commercial potential.
Few seem to know that for the past six years, the AHC, together with some of the city's leading architects, has been working on a $60 million redevelopment plan to regenerate the Block into a thriving urban centre for Aboriginal people and for visitors, including tourists. They want to demolish the Block and replace it with 62 residential dwellings - two-thirds of which would be sold to owner-occupiers. The Pemulwuy Project, named after the first Aboriginal freedom fighter, would include an indigenous business college, student hostel, gym, retail outlets and an art gallery. A communal meeting place called Red Place would incorporate a playground, giant television screen and a park.
In the AHC offices on the top corner of the Block, between Lawson and Caroline streets, the housing company's CEO, Mick Mundine, speaks passionately about the plans. "This is going to give our people a bit of self-esteem and hope for the future," he says. "Our people have lived without hope but I think with this project they will be able to see a bit of hope coming to reality."
Part of the formula, he says, is that the plan would be entirely self-funding, via money raised through home sales and private equity. "We aren't relying on any government funding," he says with pride.
The project has some heavyweight advocates - its taskforce is chaired by Tom Uren, former minister for urban and regional development with the Whitlam Government, and NSW Governor Marie Bashir and Lord Mayor Clover Moore have indicated support.
It also has some heavyweight opponents. "I'm very sceptical," says NSW Minister for Planning Frank Sartor in his Phillip Street office. Sartor is also the head of the controversial Redfern-Waterloo Authority (RWA), which was set up in 2004 to oversee redevelopment in the area and has the ability to override local councils and heritage laws, to grant concessions to private developers and to compulsorily acquire land. "Extremely sceptical. But you know, the planning considerations will be on the planning merits and if they get approval, good luck to them."
On this, Sartor acknowledges he will have the final say. He has already laid out the planning considerations. Under these rules, the Pemulwuy Project - which the AHC hopes to lodge with the Planning Department in the next couple of months - won't be allowed in its current form. "The challenge for the AHC," Sartor said in August, "is to come to the table and work with us on what we can support and back as a sustainable solution."
But Mundine claims the minister has said the project is "not negotiable'. Nearly two years since talks disintegrated, he has adopted a similar stance. "This is a privately funded project on privately owned land," he says. "I think the Aboriginal community has done enough compromising on this issue."
A battle of attrition has ensued, fuelled by bad blood on both sides. The AHC have developed a belief that Sartor is out to hinder and not help them. "He says, 'It's my way or the highway," says Mundine. "He won't listen to our reasons." Sartor denies this, saying, "They have chosen not to take the conciliatory path; they've chosen the moral highway path."
Despite a history of bickering and trading insults in the press, Mundine and Sartor have more in common than they may care to admit. Both effectively want the same thing: a development that has a strong likelihood of working, based on a mixture of residential, commercial and cultural facilities tied to a robust social services program.
But they remain at loggerheads over one key issue, and it is on this issue that the project threatens to tumble. The AHC wants 62 houses. Having already shifted from his original offer of 19 houses (to replace the ones currently occupied), Sartor says 42 is the maximum number he would allow if the AHC wants commercial development there as well, which they do.
Sixty-two is significant, say the AHC, because it is the number of Aboriginal families in the Gadigal clan who occupied the land - now known as the Block - when white settlers arrived in the 1790s, before that population succumbed to smallpox. And, according to social planners engaged by the AHC, 62 dwellings equates to a population of 400 - the critical mass they say is required to make the project work. This relates to a theory that in order to create a viable community, the residents need to be self-policing - and 400 is the minimum needed to do it.
In a sense, then, the debate might be said to hinge on 20 houses. Phillips, who became a member of the AHC five years ago after a long period of scepticism towards the housing company, sighs. "You know what? In this case I can see the advantages of a compromise. It would be fantastic to see most of those houses and also Aboriginal businesses in there but they need to move quickly because the place is getting worse. Someone's got to humble themselves."
Dennis Weatherall rents his house - just a few terraces down from the burnt-out shell on the corner of Holden Street - from the AHC. "We're ready for a change," says the 59-yearold, who runs the Community Development and Employment Program for the Redfern Aboriginal Corporation. "With better housing, you'd get better tenants and they'd feel like there was a sense of ownership there so they'd look after their houses. That would give us the opportunity to grab the young people and give them the opportunity to move into full-time employment."
Daniel Ariel lives on Holden Street, just near Phillips. A retired commercial fisherman, a committed Christian and the father of 14 children, he has lived here for 17 years. "Like a lot of people, I used to believe that the AHC was brutish and that they were in it just for their own interests," says Ariel, who changed his view when the Tax Department audited the AHC in 2003, revealing it was more than half a million dollars in debt. "I said to them, 'Why don't you just sell a house?' And they said, 'We're not selling one Aboriginal house.' I thought, 'This guy is willing to stand up for what he believes in and get flogged personally for it.'"
"This guy" is Mundine. At 59, he has been around long enough to have collected his quota of critics. But on a late-afternoon walk around the Block, it becomes clear he is something of a legend here. Residents come out of their homes to say hello; others call out to him from their cars. Some ask him to fix broken fences; one wants him to "shoo some kids out of the gym° - where Mundine trains 15 young women twice a week, including his daughter Debra. He smiles and delegates the jobs to other people. He's busy, he says. He's been busy working on the Block for 31 years.
"After the late '70s, everything started going bad," he says. "One of the saddest things for me was seeing the houses on Eveleigh Street being demolished. Aboriginal people don't want to stay here like this. What we're trying to do is bring the population back and make it sustainable."
As we turn the corner from Eveleigh Street into Vine Street, the boxer Anthony "Chock" Mundine emerges from his black Holden and disappears into the gym. His father and trainer, Tony, is close behind, stopping to say hello to his brother Mick, They leave the car's windows open. No one is going to touch Chock's car.
Anthony Mundine plans to contest the seat of Marrickville which is set to take control of Redfern under electoral boundary changes, at the State election in March. "I would consider whatever strategy is needed to fight for the Block," he said earlier this year. "If that means standing for the seat, that's what I'll do."
Debra Mundine, Mick's eldest daughter, stands outside her sister Rachel's dilapidated terrace on Vine Street. The 36-year-old left the Block for Waterloo when her two sons, now aged 14 and 15, were young. Living on Eveleigh Street, down the road from Muraweena, the now-derelict pre-school, was dangerous, she says sadly. "They were chucking syringes over the fence while the kids were playing there."
Waterloo is where much of the overflow of welfare-dependent Aboriginal people on the Block seems to run. But for Debra, living there is a temporary salve, not a substitute for being on the Block, "I want to live here so I can be back in my community where I came from."
Social planner Angie Pitts, from the I. B. Fell Housing Research Centre at the University of Sydney, conducted surveys on the AHC's behalf to assess prospective applicants for the proposed 42 owner-occupied homes in the Pemulwuy Project. The results showed the houses would be oversubscribed, she says.
Sartor is unconvinced. "I don't think anyone will buy houses there," he says. Warren Mundine, National President of the Australian Labor Party, RWA board member and cousin to Mick Mundine, is also doubtful. "If I'm the type of clientele [Mick] wants to buy back in that area, then he has to do a lot of work to convince me. I've got seven kids - why haven't I bought into that area? Well, I don't like the drugs, the alcohol and the violence. I'm not exposing my children to that."
This concern, counters Mick Mundine, has been taken into consideration. The project's by-laws force eviction if drugs are found on any premises. "The biggest problem with dobbing in drug users is the malice coming from other family members," says Ariel. "If they had the law as a back-up to say, You'll have to go, otherwise we'll lose our house,' then the onus is on the person with the drugs. That's what's going to clean the place up."
The Government owns close to a third of the land in the area controlled by the RWA but its commercial value is yet to be realised, thanks to the general prevalence of high dependency housing and crime in the Redfern-Waterloo area and, specifically, on the Block. The Planning Minister, so one argument goes, must want to redevelop the area but he has one key obstacle - the Block.
Sartor dismisses the suggestion. "This is a social initiative, not a financial initiative," he says. "We don't need to develop Redfern-Waterloo for the State's economic growth per se. When people accuse us of wanting to get developers into Redfern-Waterloo, that is such a lie. That is a big fat lie. Because, in fact, developers aren't interested."
But in March last year, The Australian Financial Review reported that at a Property Council of Australia meeting the council's NSW executive director, Ken Morrison, said: "There is no way that Redfern is going to be that commercial mini-centre with Aboriginal housing and the Block still in place. We need to sort that out before any private investors will be interested."
"We are trying to attract investors," says Sartor, "but it's never been driven by developers." According to an RWA cabinet document leaked to The Sydney Morning Herald in November 2004, consultants to the Government advised that a failure to redevelop the Block would decrease property values by 30 per cent. "The estimated market value of developments in the area is approximately $5 billion," it says. "In order to maximise social and economic returns, the Government must be able to offer planning certainty to the market within a strategic planning framework."
Mick Mundine says the Government has an in-house word for the Block: "the Blockage". Warren Mundine says he's never heard of it. "The problem is, we have a history here," he says. "We've got 30 years of failure. I'm going to have a cold Christmas dinner, I'm sure, with my family. But I'm not stepping away from this. Everyone needs to sit down and win confidence between each other that they're fair dinkum about what they say they're going to do is going to happen."
If that is to unfold, there is other history to repair. "All they've said is, 'We're going to introduce a component of housing and we've got the money; you've got to give us what we want,'" says Sartor. "They're breaching the planning controls. They just say, 'We're Aboriginal. If you don't do it, you're a raciest.' Now I will never be cowed by what I regard as unconscionable racist slurs or any other form of denigration that isn't based on the facts. Argue with me the facts because I'm not rolling over."
Accusations of racism have played a strong hand in this battle. When Sartor went on Koori radio in September 2005, he infamously said, "Get off your backside, Mick, and bring your black arse in here to talk to me about it." Warren Mundine called the comment "idiotic". Sartor apologised and Mick Mundine accepted. The pair shook hands outside the minister's office but the next day Mundine retracted his apology and called on the minister to resign.
Since then, the insults have flowed unchecked from both sides. Mundine calls Sartor "arrogant" and "racist". Sartor calls the AHC "an unmitigated disaster".
A well-known local character wanders in to the AHC offices. Coming down from drugs, numbed by alcohol, he declines an interview. "Money talks, bullshit walks," he says, hurtling away and then back towards me. "Want a smiley?" he asks, holding a cigarette lighter up to my arm. When I retract, he laughs and burns a small hole in the side of the reception desk.
I'm reminded of Warren Mundine's comment after our interview. "I hope no one firebombs your house," he said with a grin. He was clearly joking but the throwaway line says much of the emotion, history and politics that threaten to ignite over this topic.
But if those elements are pulled out of this equation, what's left seems simple: a plan for urban regeneration. So there's really only one question: could this plan work?
There are comparable precedents elsewhere that suggest it could, says Peter Droege, an internationally-acclaimed urban planner, who cites successful redevelopments in London (Brixton), Boston (Commonwealth) and San Francisco (North Beach Place). "Brixton has undergone a locally supported renewal after many years of race riots," he says. "The Commonwealth and North Beach Place developments are two of several US examples promising deep revitalisation of notoriously problem-ridden public housing schemes."
But he stresses the following caveat: "The plan needs to be embedded into a much wider area regeneration, urban design and connectivity strategy that does not rely on a continued 'Block' image, i.e. that would avoid an enclave or fortress connotation."
To this end, the RWA appears to be making contributions. Its "Human Services" arm is developing a National Indigenous Development Centre at the former Redfern Public School, as well as a Community Health Centre on the site of the old Redfern Courthouse.
Catherine Burn, the Redfern Police Commander, says the police have committed to a number of social services under this division of the RWA, including improvements to indigenous literacy and health. One of her key concerns is breaking down bad perceptions of the police. "There's always going to be hostility but we're trying to balance it," says Burn, who has seen the robbery rate in the area drop by 50 per cent in the last 12 months under her command. "We've got a football team now and we play with the Aboriginal people. Their sense of community is fantastic."
Having walked from Caroline Street to Eveleigh Street and around the corner to Vine Street, the final tum around the Block takes you on to Louis Street. Just 12 terraces remain along a lonely stretch. Of those, only seven are inhabited.
Ben Smith lives in one of them. A 45year-old self-employed labourer and father of six, he remembers going to pre-school when it was underneath the Tony Mundine gym. °That's how long I've been around," he laughs. "My auntie Rita was the first dark lady to move in to the area. My great auntie Polly, bless her soul, said to hang around - two weeks before she passed away - to keep the spirit of the clan going."
There's a photograph of a young T. J. Hickey in the front window. When Hickey was fatally impaled on a fence after a police chase in 2004 his death sparked a riot that brought black-white tensions to a head, raising questions of whether anything had been learned from two centuries of indigenous disadvantage. "He was my eldest son's best mate," says Smith quietly. "He would have been about 20, 21 by now."
On February 8, 2005, nearly a year after Hickey's death, Sartor met with the AHC to be briefed on their plan. It was on that day that discussions broke down. “I think it is an injustice what the Government is doing to us at the present moment," says Mundine. "If Frank Sartor gives us the approval, we can do it in about a year and a half."
For his part, State Opposition leader Peter Debnam says, should he come to power at the election in March, "we would sign off the project straight away". The State Government is yet to decide whether it will endorse it. In October, the Department of Planning listed the Pemulwuy Project on its Major Projects Register after the AHC submitted it in March to obtain the director-general's requirements, which will now allow the AHC to lodge their planning application.
In the last month, there has been encouraging news to suggest the impasse may dissolve. Sartor requested a meeting with the AHC on November 1, the first in nearly two years. Afterwards, he said: "Some misunderstandings were clarified. The project still needs to undergo rigorous assessment but the meeting was informative and productive."
"It was pretty positive," adds Mundine. "I won't be happy until the dotted line is signed but it's a big step forward."
"If both sides are willing to compromise, they will come up with an answer," says Phillips, leaning forward with an optimistic smile. "The spirit of it is fantastic; it will be worthwhile giving it a try. One way or another, whoever wins this battle, I just can't wait for it to come about."
Photos:
Dennis Weatherall, who runs the Community Development and Employment Program. “We’re ready for a change.”
Anthony (left) and Mick Mundine – both fighting for the Block
Mick Mundine’s daughters. Debra (left) and Rachel. “They were chucking syringes over the fence.”
Shane Phillips came to live at the Block when he was five years old.
Ben Smith and his son Benjamin. A relative urged him to stay “to keep the spirit of the clan going”.
Frank Sartor, the NSW Minister for Planning, says he is "sceptical" about the Pemulwuy Project.
A section of the Block as it is today
Plans for Red Place, the posed communal centre of the redevelopment. Drawing by Innovarchi Architects.
Quotes:
“This is going to give our people a bit of self-esteem and hope for the future.” Mick Mundinie
“I’m passionate about change because generations of our people will survive” Shane Phillips
"They're breaching the planning controls. They just say, 'We're Aboriginal. If you don't do it, you're a racist."' Frank Sartor
Source: The Sydney Morning Herald the(Sydney)magazine Issue #44 December 06 pp42-48
[This document is produced by OCR of the print article and may contain recognition errors]
]]>According to Shane Phillips, whose family has lived in the area for three generations, it was a dynamic place to grow up. “We saw a lot of strong Koori people, who all worked hard and fought for what they believed in,” he says, “and just wanted to raise their kids and get what everyone else was getting.”
But in the mid-1990s, says Phillips, “the gear hit”. The area became known for its heroin trade, attracting users from across Sydney to score and shoot up in the dark alleys of the area’s 19th century housing. “That infection just grew, and destroyed what was a great, strong place,” Phillips says.
To the local Aboriginal community, the Block is a significant and symbolic place, with the potential to house a vibrant community. To developers, it’s a near-empty piece of land in an overcrowded city.
Prime real estate just five minutes from the CBD, Redfern has been an obvious ‘black spot’ on developers’ maps for some time. However, last year’s riots following the tragic death of 17-year-old TJ Hickey, and the subsequent parliamentary inquiry in to the area, have given the NSW Government the impetus to push ahead with major redevelopment plans.
In November last year the Carr Government’s agenda was revealed in documents leaked to the Sydney Morning Herald.
Soon after, the Redfern-Waterloo Act went through parliament with full support from the Liberal opposition. “I said the day after the riot at Redfern that the real solution to this was to bulldoze the Block. I can hardly argue when the Government comes forward to do that and so much more,” said opposition leader John Brogden.
In its mandate to improve the socio-economic standing of the area, the newly formed Redfern-Waterloo Authority has the power to acquire private land, bypass heritage and planning laws, and delegate its powers to private subsidiary corporations. According to property lawyer Damien Barnes, while these powers are not unprecedented, they are extraordinary considering the area is highly residential.
The Block has a problematic history, closely tied to mismanagement by its guardians, the Aboriginal Housing Company. In 1997, the company demolished a number of houses and relocated residents in an attempt to get rid of the drug trade. Ann Weldon, Chairperson of the Aboriginal Housing Office, says there was a lot of division over this decision, and the AHC has still not delivered on a promise it made at that time: to build one house for every two that it knocked down.
“I would like to see that promise obligated, irrespective of what the company are negotiating with other people, because there was major rivalry and discontent within the Aboriginal community over relocation, and the implications of that,” says Weldon.
Peter Valilis, AHC Project Director, concedes that the AHC has not been an effective community representative. “The Company didn’t do two things in the past: it didn’t get the support of the majority of the stakeholders, and it didn’t start off with a social agenda.”
“We now recognise that there are a lot of direct and indirect stakeholders of this area. Even though the Housing Company owns the land, and no one, legally, has a say beyond that; you have government stakeholders, tenants, local people who live near the Block, the business community, academics. There’s a long list of people who have an interest in this area.”
For the last five years, the AHC has been developing plans to revitalise the area. The Company’s ‘Pemulwuy Plan’ would see 62 new houses built on the Block, along with an open-plan retail district, offices, a gymnasium and an Aboriginal business college. The plan has received two social planning awards, but is reliant on Government funding to proceed.
Valilis explains that the Pemulwuy Plan came about following lengthy community consultation: “Everyone had a say, and eventually, not everyone was happy, but we found some common ground.”
That is, until the Redfern-Waterloo Authority weighed into the debate.
In February, Frank Sartor, the NSW Minister responsible for Redfern-Waterloo, visited the AHC to discuss the future of the Block. According to Peter Valilis, the Minister told the Company’s board members that he wanted “no black faces on the Block”.
Sartor’s spokeswoman denies the claim.
However, the Minister has made his opposition to the Pemulwuy Plan clear, dubbing it an experiment in high-dependency housing.
Valilis is adamant that the plan will go ahead, with or without State Government support. He describes the Minister’s approach as “it’s my way or the highway”. “Well, we got in the car and drove off down the highway,” he says.
However, if negotiations between the two parties sour, Sartor could, in line with the Land Acquisition Act, compulsorily acquire the Block and develop it as he pleases. Valilis’s response to this suggestion is a defiant “let him try.”
Democrats Senator Aden Ridgeway takes the threat more seriously. He believes the local community does not have the political clout to take on a money-hungry Minister, backed by some very rich developers.
“There’s good argument to say that any decision to compulsorily acquire what is private land could amount to a breach of the Racial Discrimination Act, on the grounds that it is treating one group differently to the rest of the community,” he says.
“I think Australia’s become so immune to looking at these things in certain ways. If [the ‘no black faces’ comment] were said in the United States or the United Kingdom you’d have race riots on the streets. Aboriginal people locally have somehow been conditioned into accepting that this is normal, and the government and the rest of the community is saying that it’s okay. Well I’m saying it’s not. The standards of the law should apply equally, irrespective of the colour of a person’s skin,” says Ridgeway
If the Redfern-Waterloo Authority acquired the Block, it would be the first time in Australian history that land won by Aboriginal people as a result of the 1970s land rights struggle was taken back from them.
Shane Phillips believes that much of the local Aboriginal community is behind the AHC’s Pemulwuy Plan, and is prepared to fight for it. “There are so many people who want to come back to Redfern. They don’t want to come back while it’s all drugs, and drug dealers are still living here. That’s the intention of the housing company: bring back some working families and give the kids an opportunity to help rebuild the place, but also to see positive role models in their community.”
“A few weeks ago there was a fundraiser for a bloke, a great family man from the area, who’s ill at the moment. Everyone came together and it was great to see all those faces, who you know have had words or had disputes, all come together and sit at the same tables.”
“People come together for a cause,” says Phillips.
The
Redfern-Waterloo Authority might be just the cause to bring community back to
the Block.
]]>
The plan, revealed this week, involves selling government land, redeveloping public housing and attempting to attract jobs to the area.
The government will establish the Redfern-Waterloo Authority to guide the redevelopment, which it has been claimed will have the power to override Sydney City Council planning regulations.
Indigenous groups, coming together under the name Redfern Organisation of Aboriginal Unity, today labelled the plan a "land grab" and attacked the Carr government for failing to consult them.
The organisation warned there would be "determined and unified resistance" to any government attempt to forcibly acquire land at Redfern owned by the Aboriginal Housing Company.
But it stressed any protests would be peaceful.
Indigenous leaders have planned a rally on Monday at Waterloo Green, adjacent to two public housing towers slated for redevelopment.
"We're appalled that the government has refused to rule out the forcible acquisition of Aboriginal land," indigenous representative Shane Phillips said.
"If they were to try and take our land we'd do what any other reasonable people would do. We'd adopt the tactics of Gandhi and Martin Luther King to try and stop them."
Mr Phillips said Aboriginal people were not against the Redfern-Waterloo Authority or development.
"We want Redfern and Waterloo to become secure and prosperous, but Aboriginal people should be able to share in this, not be pushed out.
Redfern was the site of a race riot this year sparked by the death of Aboriginal teenager Thomas "TJ" Hickey.
The NSW government said it would not compulsorily acquire land or force out public housing tenants.
A spokeswoman for Redfern-Waterloo Minister Frank Sartor said there would be no reduction in public housing in the area.
"There's no intention to push out any indigenous residents or public housing tenants," she said.
"There's no intention to use compulsory acquisition powers to resume the Block, and that seems to be one of the main concerns (of Aboriginal groups)."
She said Redfern-Waterloo was an "unusual" area with "unique problems" and the government believed "something's got to be done down there".
Mr Sartor had not made up his mind about how the redevelopment would proceed and wanted to consult widely to come up with the best plan.
AAP
December 2, 2004 SMH - AAP
]]>During 2009 and 2010, Bernie Coates (HNSW) and Bruce Judd (UNSW) lead consultations with 45 key stakeholders in the Redfern and Waterloo areas to find out what people think about renewal and regeneration and how the community can best be engaged in the renewal process.
A list of those who were consulted is at Appendix 1 at the bottom of this page.
The key themes and issues emerging from the stakeholder consultations were:
Concern about residents’ safety and the impacts of anti social behaviour on residents’ amenity and community life. Stakeholders want better security, and coordinated agency action to improve safety. In particular, we were told:For more information: Contact Bernie Coates at Housing NSW on 92683487 October 2010
Participants:
| Organisation | Name |
| Aboriginal Housing Company | Mick Mundine Lani Tuitavake Richard Green |
| Chamber of Commerce | Mary-Lynne Pidcock |
| City of Sydney | Dominic Grenot John Maynard |
| City Councillor & tenant | Irene Doutney |
| Connect Redfern | Jo Fletcher |
| The Factory Community Centre | Patrick Russell Michael Shreenan Jose Perez |
| ICRCSD | David White Charmaine Jones Pam Marsh |
| Inner Sydney Tenants Advice and Advocacy Service | Phoenix van Dyke Jacqui Swinburne |
| National Centre of Indigenous Excellence | Jason Glanville |
| Mudgin-Gal | Dixie Link-Gordon |
| Ogden Lane Services | Jane Rogers – Community Transport John Geerligs - Food Distribution Rosemary Perkov - RICHES |
| REDWatch | Geoff Turnbull |
| Redfern Community Centre | Scott Elphinstone |
| Redfern NAB | Lindsay Dale Randall Johns Barbara Rhall Brian Parker Denny Powell Rita Maddren Darryl Dartnell |
| South Sydney Community Aide | Jhan Leach Helen Campbell |
| South Sydney Youth Services | Shane Brown |
| The Shop Women and Girls Centre | Susan Fowler Julie Packer Colleen Bradshaw |
| Tribal Warrior | Shane Phillips |
| Waterloo Tenants | Norah McGuire Ross Smith Simon Shabshay Marlene Newton Di Whitworth Lynne Stewart (former tenant)Mabel Chang |
| Wyanga Aboriginal Aged Care | Millie Ingram |
| Yarn’n Aboriginal Employment Services | Deb Nelson |